Patrick Wintour: It is often said that all political careers end in failure. But few end in frenetic failure. No one can accuse Tony Blair of not going the extra thousand miles for peace, leaving the grey bureaucracy of the EU in Brussels on Friday afternoon, heading for Ankara, followed by the heat of Cairo.

Until recently, John Guma-Komwiswa was living in two worlds. By day he had a good job. In the morning he would commute a short distance from his home in Bermondsey to Becket House, a central London office that works with asylum and immigration cases.

Yesterday the Liberal Democrats cemented their reputation as a party struggling to be taken seriously after Lembit Opik announced that he had split with his television weather forecaster fiancee and was dating one half of the kitsch pop duo the Cheeky Girls.

Eating out in a restaurant should be a pleasurable experience. But a survey reveals that it is a source of intimidation, embarrassment and shame even for young professionals, due to ignorance of restaurant protocol and a lack of knowledge about food and wine.

When it comes to comedy, Matt Lucas has been inseparable from David Walliams ever since they launched the Little Britain phenomenon more than five years ago. Yesterday, however, the other man in his life emerged when Lucas wed his long-term partner, Kevin McGee.

The White House yesterday faced fresh accusations of tailoring intelligence to suit its political viewpoint from a former CIA analyst barred from publishing a critical newspaper commentary on American policy towards Iran.